Vancouver Cycling Clubs

This date should be circled in your calender and ALL CVC members are expected to participate , rain (unless there is a tsunami alert) or shine.Family members are more than welcome to join in this fun ride.A reminder to some CVC members this ride is NOT a race!

Information about the ride can be found in http://www.cmhacommunityride.ca/index.php.

Benjamin Lowbeer on his recent family trip to Maui.That’s the Haleakala summit of the “The Longest, Steepest Paved Road on Earth”.
Watch out G.Janos,Ben wants your Club’s polka dot jersey…..

Traditionally CVC don’t have a scheduled organized weekend club rides in the winter months.However there are a few cvc members and friends who regularly meet up at Bean-Around-The-World coffee on 20th and Main St around(not time conscious) 9:00am every sunday.This is an open,non-club sanctioned ride and a chance to get to know some of the CVC regulars;where the pace at this of the year is normally slow to medium.Rides are weather dependent and it’s a common courtesy to have extended rear fender on your bike when riding in wet weather with this group.Riding etiquette will be enforced for group safety.Distance 70km ~ 100km.

So, something called Get Out There apparently has some fantastically discerning readers. Because for 2011, those readers chose things. And one of the things they chose was us.

I know! In their 2011 Readers' Choice awards, EV was recognized as "Best Cycling Club, Western Canada." They also picked an Eastern Canada winner, but didn't make any claims about which club was best in Canada. Whatever, you know it was us. After all, they made this year's Award logo red, black, and white, which is THE BEST COLOUR SCHEME EVER! We're totally not biased when we say that, and we'll pretend we weren't the reason.

In the tradition of acceptance speeches, EV would now like to fake humility for a moment and thank all the people who made this moment possible: the voting readership of Get Out There, and the many members of EV that do all the things that make us the Best Cycling Club, Western Canada (But Probably Really in All of Canada, and Maybe The World). Of course, EV's members are EV, so I guess we're bragging again.

On a less boastful note, The Best Cycling Club, Western Canada would like to humbly reach out to anyone who might want to join us: we're looking for a few good cyclists. If you like road racing, and you want to join a team that does more to make road racing in BC possible than any other, we'd love to hear from you. We've had some turnover in our membership team (the old Membership Guy got teenagers, and a job or something), so you can write to rcousine@gmail.com if you have any questions.

Despite very low temperatures and icy roads, Escape Velocity's annual Toy Ride ran as scheduled on November 19, 2011. Even in the face of these conditions, riders did come out!

The Tim Hortons Community Cruiser provided coffee and snacks to the hardy participants, and we raised $1300 for the Lower Mainland Christmas Bureau, who provide toys, clothing and food for needy families.

Our sponsoring bike shops stepped up, with La Bicicletta helping us collect donations, and Wentings Cycle & Mountain Shop donating a gift certificate door prize. The lucky winner was Doug Brons.

Thanks go to all the riders who didn't let little things like freezing cold deter them from supporting a good cause. And we'd like to extend a special thanks to our friends from Wedgewood Cycling Team, who continue to support this event generously, as they have for many years.

EV has big plans for this year's Spring Series. Very big plans. Would you be excited if we told you that it might get so big, Spring would no longer be able to contain it? Well, you should be excited by that!

OK, trust me, it will seem more exciting once we actually reveal what is happening. So this is a notice, to, um, prepare to be excited some time in the future. Probably. But it's going to be great. Really.

To all CVC members,
Happy New Year and hope you all had a great holiday season. We have a lot to look forward to in the new year as well as our new kits. Weather hasn’t been great lately but hopefully we get some good weather this week. Planning to have a club ride this weekend. Come out and join us at the Bean 9 AM on Sunday, January 15, 2012.

Behold this photo:

That's Garneau Evolutionist David Gerth, recent winner of the club sportsmanship award, repairing the wheel of Tristan Hughes, recent co-winner of the mechanically declined award. For bonus points, David is doing it with the only cone wrench that was at hand, which was, uh, part of the mechanically declined trophy. Not only is it beautiful, it is also useful.

In other ridiculous news, Tristan, who won for getting multiple flats on a club ride without having a spare tube, well...I'll let David tell it: "Sunday morning, not 12 hours after receiving his award for mechanical incompetence, Tristan got a flat. We all stood around him in awe as he emptied his pockets...without producing a tube."

In other news, the guy who won the club member of the year award is still on the board, and the guy who won the crash prize crashed again. We can only assume the most improved riders are getting better, and the most dedicated riders are out training.

Having exhausted the tragic and farcial versions of history, we can only assume these moments will repeat very shortly in another form, possibly Brechtian musical theatre.

Escape Velocity: a club with a sense of history, extending back at least as far as the weekend.

Every year, in one of Escape Velocity's best-loved and most hallowed traditions, our members gather at some place with good beer and generous portions, so that we can take awkward photos of them eating. Here are this year's pix:

Also, we shame or glorify some deserving individuals.

Mechanically Declined

Accepting for both himself and Aidan Caves, his absent partner in crime, Tristan Hughes told the story of how they both got flat tires on a group ride where neither was carrying spare tubes or pumps. Because they never carried spare tubes or pumps. A few flats later, mom was called to pick them up.

But don't worry folks: they now "sometimes" carry pumps and tubes. So lesson partially learned.

Dedication to Training (dEVo)

For logging everything onto Strava (and having a lot to log!), Wilson Tran scooped up the award for the youth member most willing to suffer now for glory later.

Most Improved (dEVo)

Aidan Caves was not exactly slow at the start of this year, but then he went and qualified for the Pan-Am Junior games. Unfortunately, he couldn't make it out tonight, either because he was training or because he got another flat tire.

Dedication to Training (EVeryone else) and Most Improved

Dave Stephens collected two awards as an early adopter of Strava who rode everywhere (including "Spain," which we think actually meant "Italy"), logged everything, and apparently got something out of all that riding and logging, since he shot from obscurity and TT specialization to glorious crit victories. Dave went from Cat 4 races at the start of the year to a spot on the elite GE roster today (and you should totally read his team bio at their site, where he lists "macroeconomics" as one of his hobbies. Also, indoor rowing is a thing?)

rEVolution Leader's Award

Dave Gerth collected the club sportsmanship award, as a result of being as nice as he is fast (he's quite fast) and helping shuttle numerous dEVos to their appointed races in a totally non-creepy way. We're pretty sure this is how Garneau Evolution scouts fresh talent.

Keeper of the Flame

Joe Tam could not dodge this award any longer: he has been running the WTNC since approximately 700 AD, he answers Every. Email. We. Get. And he is as close as EV gets to having a living embodiment of the spirit of Escape Velocity. So we gave him a candle. Honourable mention must go to, well, most of the rest of the board, who got nominated for their various unsung contributions to making EV what it is.

Best Racing or Training Crash/Best Story

Ryan Cousineau (by which I mean me) won the crash prize by crashing in a safe and graceful fashion when he blew a front tire at the velodrome. Normally people run towards fallen riders at the track, in this case, the other trackies just assumed Ryan was fine. He totally did NOT win it for wiping out J. Gerth in an unrelated rookie-move chop on the track last Spring.

Best story went to this exchange on Facebook, which featured Ryan, Tobin Copley, Mark Wan, and Stuart Lynne, in a tale of Cat 4 smack-talk. With teammates like these, who needs Glotman-Simpson?

And then, this happened:

That's it for 2011. See you next year.

(For past Awards Nights, see 2010, 2009, and 2008.)

Escape Velocity is a very special cycling club. No, not that kind of special; the other, exclusive, selective kind of special.

How exclusive are we? Well, meet "Tobin," our membership director:

(Photo by Doug Brons, EV member.)

Nevertheless, we are now accepting applications to join Escape Velocity. Why go through the hassle? Well, because with exclusivity comes awesomeness. We have a page that explains what it means to be an EV member.

In short, we're bike racers from 5 to 85 (at 86, the Velo Vets recruit you), and we take two things seriously:
-bike racing (road, track, and CX, with BMX as part of our youth-development process)
-giving back to bike racing

If you join our club, it means becoming part of one of the oldest organized clubs in Metro Vancouver, the club that runs more bike races than anyone else in the province, and a club with a structured program for developing young riders.

We also have a sense of camaraderie that I think is rare in a club of any size, much less one as big and diverse as EV. Do we like to have fun? See the photo of our membership director above. Let us tell you about the time we had a hot tub at one of our races (and why we'll never do that again). Come meet our amazing members, who in the rest of their lives are bankers, entrepreneurs, rocket scientists, former Olympians, architects, fire fighters, electricians, graphic designers, IT professionals, massage therapists, and, uh, whatever it is the web nerd does.

Most of all, join our club because you are amazing (or if you're too young to be amazing, you want to be amazing someday) and you want to hang out with amazing people. Join a club where it's not whether you win or lose, but whether you raced well, helped out, and had fun.

If that appeals to you, read our intro for prospective members, and then fill out our online application.

Team Escape Velocity will be hosting the annual Toy Ride on Saturday, November 19, 2011 in support of the Lower Mainland Christmas Bureau. All cyclists, cycling clubs and teams are urged to come out and join us in support of this worthy cause. Riders are encouraged to bring donations in the form of cash or cheques made out to the Lower Mainland Christmas Bureau. Monetary donations are preferred as this provides the LMCB the most flexibility in assisting those individuals who need help the most. The LMCB will issue tax receipts to donors at a later date.

Look for the Escape Velocity tent and the Tim Horton's community van in the parking lot beside the Jericho Youth Hostel at the foot of Discovery Street any time after 8:00 AM. Please arrive early and join us for coffee and Tim Bits, as our ride will leave at 9:15. As usual, this event goes rain or shine.

All participants LMCB Toy Ride will have their name entered into a draw for a $50 gift certificate that has been graciously donated by Wentings Cycle and Mountain Shop.

If you are unable to attend the ride but still wish to make a donation, you may do so by dropping off your donation at La Bicicletta, 233 W. Broadway, during regular business hours until the end of November. Please add “E-V Toy Ride” to the memo field of your cheque.

We encourage all cyclists to join us for the ride. Thank you in advance for your contribution.

Event Details

Date: November 19, 2011

Location: Jericho Youth Hostel, 1515 Discovery Street, Vancouver, BC

Time: Coffee at 8:00 AM, Ride departs at 9:15 AM

Route: Escape Velocity Richmond Route (approximately 80km).

For more information on the Lower Mainland Christmas Bureau, see: http://www.lmcb.ca/

For more information on the Escape Velocity Toy Ride, contact Cam Finnigan:evtoyride@telus.net

2011 Results are here.

Please contact jak_new(at)me(dot)com if you have any questions or concerns with the results and he will be happy to address them ASAP.

New PreFondo Event & B.C Provincial Championship Races For 2011.

Vancouver, BC. Friday March 18th 2011

On Sunday, June 12th 2011, The Wedgewood Cycling Team presents its seventh annual road race on the streets of Vancouver.

Returning to the scenic route surrounding Pacific Spirit Park near the University of British Columbia, the race will again be set against a spectacular backdrop of the Pacific Ocean and the Coastal Mountains and will attract racers from around the Pacific Northwest and Canada anxious to compete in one of Canada’s premier cycling events.

NEW for 2011 is the PreFondo Race/Ride which is sure to attract a great deal of interest for people preparing to ride one of the many GranFondo or Charity Rides this year. “The PreFondo event is the perfect training for group riding on safe and closed roads,” explained Event Director  Jonathan Wornell. “There are many great events that are encouraging new riders, some who may be intimidated by riding in a large group. We wanted to create something that would be accessible and which could be ridden with team mates, friends or family in preparation for the bigger events.”

Registration for the PreFondo event will be have limited space available so riders are encouraged to sign up early.

Participants will again enjoy racing on completely closed roads and benefit from full neutral support provided by Mavic and The Bike Gallery (www.vancouverbikegallery.com).

Camosun Hill will provide extra excitement  in the Senior Men and Senior Women’s races as they battle for the King and Queen of the Mountain prize.

On line registration closes on June 8th (midnight) after which time registration and package pick up will be at The Bike Gallery (4433 West 10th Ave) 2pm – 5pm Saturday June 11th (no credit card payment available). Early Bird pricing is available until May 15th.

Set on the edge of Point Grey Village & the University Of British Columbia our Expo Village will give companies the opportunity to show off their goods & services to the riders, crowd, and visitors, opportunities for space in the Village Expo are now available.

The Race will again be a primary fund raising initiative for the Wedgewood Cycling Team, in support of the BC Cancer Foundation. Funds raised this year will go towards helping the fight against Cancer in British Columbia.
Full details and registration is now live at www.teamwedgewood.com.
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SHAPE PROPERTIES CORP. is a real estate investment and development company based in Vancouver, British Columbia. Shape’s current focus is on acquiring large development sites for retail or mixed use development, and acquiring existing shopping centres that are suitable for densification, redevelopment or repositioning. www.shapeproperties.com

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The Relais & Chateaux Wedgewood Hotel & Spa, The Bike Gallery, Sierra Systems, Vancouver Litigation Support Services, Airey Group, Odlum Brown Ltd, Meyers Norris Penny & Tora Design all sponsor the Wedgewood Cycling Team.

There are still limited spaces still available for what will surely be the most sought after spin class in Vancouver.

As part of the “24 Hour Spin” in support of the BC Cancer Foundation Ride To Conquer Cancer, the Wedgewood Cycling Team and Team Granfondo Axel Merckx are hosting a Fundraising Spin Class led by Olympic medalist and ten-time Tour de France rider Axel Merckx and, arguably the greatest Vancouver Canuck of all time, Trevor Linden.

Lucky participants will have the opportunity to spin with their heroes in an intimate setting for an experience they will never forget. All participants will also receive a Livestrong jersey autographed by Merckx and Linden. Only fifteen spots for this great opportunity are available, and they can be secured with a minimum bid of $500 per spot (tax receipts will be provided). 100% of proceeds will benefit the BC Cancer Foundation. The one-hour class will run from 5:00 to 6:00 pm on Saturday, March 5, at Vancouver’s new Fit FX Studio (443 West 10th Avenue, www.fitfxstudio.com).

Bids will be accepted by e-mail and can be forwarded to Ross Turnbull at 24hourspin@teamwedgewood.com. Riders will need to supply their own bike that can be mounted onto stationery trainer.

UPDATE: As of 10:00 pm Tuesday, March 1 over half of the 15 spots have been sold. Act soon as the class is bound to sell out!

About the 24 Hour Spin

This very special Spin Class is being held in conjunction with a 24 Hour training session by Team Granfondo Axel Merck, Team Wedgewood and friends from the Trek Red Truck p/b Mosaic Homes Cycling Team, to raise funds for their team members participating in the BC Cancer Foundation Ride to Conquer Cancer. Merckx, along with friends and teammates from all three teams, including Olympian and multi-time World Mountain Bike Champion Alison Sydor, will spin over a 24-hour period in a relay format that will include sprint competitions, in a festival-like atmosphere.

As part of the event a Silent Auction will be held featuring copy number 511 of 525 of the Eddy Merckx Limited Edition Art Book. No longer available in stores, this treasured piece contains memories of the Cannibal’s career and is truly a collector’s item. Other cycling jerseys, memorabilia and cycling equipment, including a bike courtesy of the Vancouver Bike Gallery will be on display for bidding. Shimano Canada has also just stepped up to the plate and have donated a pair of Dura Ace WH-7850C50 carbon tubular wheels!

Donations will be collected at the event and bids on the Silent Auction items will close at noon on Sunday, March 6th, and bidders must be present in person to bid. Coffee and refreshments, including Belgium Waffles, will be available courtesy of Vancouver’s Pâtisserie Lebeau.

Ride To Conquer Cancer Team Granfondo Axel Merckx here

Ride To Conquer Cancer Team Wedgewood here

Fit FX Studio is located at 4439 West 10th Ave, Vancouver www.fitfxstudio.com

Vancouver Bike Gallery is located at 4433 West 10th Ave, Vancouver www.vancouverbikegallery.com

Pâtisserie Lebeau is located at 1728 West 2nd Ave, Vancouver www.grababetterwaffle.com

Details on the Eddy Merckx Limited Edition Art Book here